After two years of setbacks, broken promises and delays, the Democratic Republic of Congo on Wednesday (21 November) effectively opened the starting gates for a crucial election that could alleviate — or perhaps worsen — the decades-long crisis gripping the vast central African nation.

At stake is the political stewardship of a mineral-rich country that has never known a peaceful transition of power since independence from Belgium in 1960.

The EU yesterday (12 December) imposed sanctions against seven top DR Congo security officials for their role in deadly clashes with protesters against President Joseph Kabila.

Ramazani Shadary, the “pro-Kabila” candidate in this month’s vote, is a key ally of the president who served as interior minister during violent crackdowns on demonstrators protesting against Kabila staying in power.

He is among the senior DR Congo officials to be blacklisted by the EU in May 2017 for serious human rights violations.

The opposition has claimed that Shadary, if he wins, will only be a figurehead president with Kabila holding onto power behind the scenes.

Officials from CENI on Sunday said the army and police repelled an attack by a rebel group on a warehouse with voting machines in the troubled eastern Beni province.

With barely six days left until the vote, election officials said they were still awaiting a batch of forms for reporting and counting which were en route from South Africa, while denying any delay.

The forms need to be distributed to 80,000 polling stations across the country by Saturday ahead of Sunday’s election.

Blighted by violence, Ebola

The election takes place with the country’s east still blighted by inter-ethnic strife and militia violence, with exhausted residents hoping the vote will offer some kind of respite after years of bloodshed.

One of the armed groups battling for control of the region’s rich mineral resources is the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), a shadowy militia rooted in Ugandan Islam that has killed hundreds of people since 2014.

Over the past month, at least 48 people in and around the northeastern city of Beni have been killed by suspected ADF militants, including seven UN peacekeepers, according to an AFP toll.

The poll is also likely to be hampered by an Ebola outbreak in two eastern provinces, North Kivu and Ituri, that has claimed more than 300 lives since being declared on 1 August, health officials say.

A cholera epidemic has also left 857 people dead since the start of the year, the World Health Organization said last month.